70 Rhodora [M AY 
Michaux's material, as shown in his herbarium and by his journal, 
coming from Lake St. John and Mistassini River in northern Quebec. 
This prostrate northern shrub, which abounds from eastern Gaspé 
Co. to Mistassini River, Quebec, southward across New Brunswick, 
Maine and New Hampshire, extending westward at least to the 
Ottawa, the Hudson and the Delaware systems, was described by 
Pursh as Prunus depressa, with the illuminating comment: “This 
low shrub, which spreads its branches very much and does not rise 
above one foot from the ground, is known by the name of Sand- 
cherries. The fruit is black, small, and agreeably tasted." 
Familiar with Pursh’s Prunus depressa, which in 1892 Bailey 
treated! as typical P. pumila but which he subsequently seems to 
have ignored, the writer was, therefore, puzzled to make his own 
experience fit Bailey’s later descriptions of P. pumila: “Decumbent 
at the base when old, but the young growth strictly erect and often 
reaching 5-8 ft. in height, . . . fruit . . . smalland usually 
scarcely edible"? or Wight’s equally definite: “shrub 11% to 5 feet 
high, . . . erect when .young." When, however, on visiting 
the sand dunes of Lake Ontario in Oswego County, New York, with 
Professors Wiegand and Eames, he made the acquaintance of the 
upright shrub of the Great Lakes, it at once became apparent that 
the Great Lake P. pumila was quite distinct from P. depressa. Dif- 
fering in its prostrate habit, more palatable fruit and more north- 
eastern range, P. depressa is also distinguished by its leaves being 
less acuminate and often obtusely spatulate, thinner, less prominently 
veiny but more glaucous beneath, and usually with more crenate 
teeth, by its commonly shorter and less fimbriate stipules and by 
its more elongate, ellipsoid rather than subglobose or ovoid, stones. 
In determining to which of these shrubs we should apply the name 
Prunus pumila, Bailey, as already noted, stated that “ Linnaeus’ 
characterization” shows “that Linnaeus meant to describe the 
prostrate plant." But this is not indicated by the definite statement 
of Linnaeus that P. pumila has “the stature of Amygdalus nana,” 
a species “2-5 feet high."^ Linnaeus took the name pumila from 
! "Miller's figure, so far as it goes, and Linnaeus’ characterization, show that 
Linnaeus meant to describe the prostrate and long-leaved plant "— Bailey, Cult. 
Native Plumsand Cherries, 62 (1892). 
? Bailey, Cycl. Am. Hort. 1450 (1901), 
3 L. Mant. 75 (1767). 
$ Boissier, Fl. Orient. ii. 644 (1872), 
